


Father

by Liviania



Category: Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms, Original Work
Genre: Deal with a Devil, General Unpleasantness, The Devil is a Sneaky Bastard, child sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-06
Updated: 2016-01-06
Packaged: 2018-05-12 03:45:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5651356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liviania/pseuds/Liviania
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The devil always comes to collect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Father

Once upon a time, there lived a man with three sons, each more handsome and more intelligent than the last.  Everyone talked about all the great things those boys were going to do, and congratulated the man on raising three such wonderful boys.

The oldest boy was the apple of his papa's eye.  He was broad-shouldered and athletic, the sort of boy you could live vicariously through.  When he was just turned sixteen, the man discovered that he was dying.  He would never see his boys, any of them, become men in turn.

He never said it, but the wish beat strong in his heart.  He would do anything to live.

* * *

One day, not long later, a man stopped him as he walked along, just as he reached the spot where the two main thoroughfares crossed each other.

"Good day, sir," this man said.  "Not that you can enjoy it, I wouldn't think, given that it is one of your last."

"How did you - "

"My dear sir, this is my business.  I always know what is due to me, and when it is time to collect."

It is a fact of life that you don't know when the devil is working on you, not most of the time.  He likes to do his work in friendly guises and quiet whispers.  But there are times when he likes to do his work as bold as brass, when he knows he has you hooked before you even say a word.

Thus it was then.  No introductions had been made, but both men knew exactly who they were talking to.

"I can save your life," the devil said.

The man nodded.  He was listening.

"Your middle child.  Fourteen, isn't he?  A bit of a brat, really."  The boy wasn't that bad, actually.  He was beginning to discover a passion for making the world a better place, and expressed it about as well as most young people who think they've invented properly crediting the inventor of the wheel.  "All you have to do is exchange his life for yours.  You get his remaining years, more than enough to see your dear eldest boy become a man.  It's practically two wishes in one."

* * *

That night, the man held a pillow over his middle son's face as he slept.  So deep asleep was he that he barely struggled, although he did struggle.  The body always wants to live. 

The man smoothed the sheets around him.

At the funeral, no one else cried louder at his sudden passing.

* * *

A scant four years later, the man heard a knock at the door.  _Duh duh-duh duh duh_.  When he opened the door, the devil strode in as if he already had an invitation.

"Yes?" the man asked.

"I've come to collect," said the devil.

"No, I received all my son's remaining years."

"All four of them.  He was going to drown tonight after jumping off a trestle to impress his fellows."

"You promised that I'd see my boys be men, and then some!"

"No, I promised that you would see your eldest become a man.  He reached his majority two years ago, did he not?"

The man swallowed.  He did not want die.  He did not want to go to hell.

"You can have my youngest," he offered.

"A pretty child," replied the devil.  "Somewhat scrawny though, isn't he?  Maybe one day he'd grow bigger, like his older brother."

The man thought of his eldest son, and a flash of bitterness went through him.  He'd traded his middle son for him, and what did he get?  A boy who moved out and got married as soon as he could, and who hadn't even had sons of his own yet despite plenty of opportunity.  Four measly years, just to witness that.

"You can have my eldest," he said, decided.

"Very well.  I'll take care of the older one and you take care of the little one, hmm?"

"What?"

"Oh, I rarely turn down anything once it's been offered to me."

* * *

Everyone talked about how sad it was.  A family, once so full of joy and hope, now gone.  The youngest died of the same mysterious malady that took the second so sudden, and on the same day the oldest was so brutally murdered in his own home.

No one was surprised when the man picked up and moved, away from a town full of such sad memories.

* * *

The man married again.  He'd selected his wife carefully.  She understood that he would get her pregnant, again and again, and sacrifice their children to the devil.  In return, he gave her a house draped in velvet and rich food.

The first time, he waited until the devil came for the child.  It happened when the girl was ten.  The devil let it be known that he wasn't adverse to taking his payment in advance.  After all, the man would get more years that way.  And so he also sacrificed his other children eight, five, and three.  (There had been a stillbirth in there.  What a waste of opportunity.)

The next time, the devil let him know that the baby had only a year of life, for it had been born weak.  "Perhaps you would like to give the year to your wife instead, so that she could bear another one for you?"

"No," the man said dismissively.  "She's clearly getting too old to bear, then.  Too fragile.  Let her pass.  That year is mine."

* * *

And so the man left his second wife on the streets to die, before she'd entirely cleaned herself of the blood of the birthing bed.  He took a third wife, equally mercenary to her predecessor, and so his long life went.

Until one day, he offered up his newest babe and the devil didn't come.  He slit the mother's throat, and still the devil didn't come.

He came the next day, whistling jauntily to peer at the man through jail bars.  It was quite the media sensation, man killing his young wife and baby.  Especially since the man appeared to have multiple identities, and many suspicious deaths in his past.  They would never, however, quite uncover just where he came from or how long his serial killing had gone on.  Certain websites ascribed hundreds of killings to him, even though he was clearly too young to have that many kids.

The man's cellmates' bodies lay around him.  He'd bashed their heads into the stone walls.

"You were supposed to be here yesterday."

"I told you when we first met: I always know when it is time to collect."

"No!  I must have dozens of years left."

"Just look at all these you've wasted," said the devil, gesturing at the bloody cell floor.  He shrugged.  "Honestly, those kids didn't have much to offer considering you intended to kill them from the moment they were conceived.  Never much potential there.  I let you live anyway because it was entertaining."

The man gaped.

"But really, it's gotten boring.  Just the same thing, over and over.  Haven't these reality TV shows taught you anything?  You have to keep it fresh."  He clicked his tongue.

The man touched his suddenly old flesh, sagging too his knees.

"No point in keeping you young now, after all.  Don't worry.  You'll have plenty of nurses in hell.  You arranged for them yourself."

The man's heart gave out.

And though he did not live, the devil was quite happy with his ever after.

**Author's Note:**

> One morning, when I was halfway between waking and dreaming, I thought, "What is the worst thing in the world?" That weird bit of neurons firing is where this twisted tale started.


End file.
